One of the ironies in health care is that drug treatments laden with dangerous side effects will almost always be quickly adopted by conventional physicians, in part because of aggressive and shrewd marketing by pharmaceutical companies, but doctors fret over the alleged dangers of nutrients.
In October, the American Academy of Pediatrics took the “bold” step of recommending a doubling of the amount of vitamin D for infants, children, and adolescents. The previous recommendation had been for 200 IU daily of vitamin D beginning sometime during the first two months of life. The new recommendation called for 400 IU of vitamin D daily starting within a few days after birth.
Unless your head has been in the sand, you have seen many articles describing the remarkable research on vitamin D. Nearly everyone becomes deficient during the winter months, when the sun is too low to stimulate production of the vitamin, and large percentages of the population are deficient throughout the year.
As a result, even generally conservative and cautious physicians, such as Walter Willett, MD, of Harvard University, have been recommending 1,000 IU of vitamin D daily for every infant, child, and adult – with a doubling of this dose for people with dark complexions (who are more resistant to the vitamin D-producing effect of sunlight on skin).
So while the American Academy of Pediatrics has increased its recommendations for vitamin D, the organization essentially chickened out when it came to a meaningful recommendation. By proposing that infants and children receive only 400 IU of vitamin D daily, the Academy has ensured continued, widespread deficiencies.
Thursday, December 18, 2008
Glucosamine and Chondroitin Do Work in Osteoarthritis
A couple of months ago, researchers published the latest findings of the Glucosamine/Chondroitin Arthritis Intervention Trial (GAIT), a study that compared these natural building blocks of knee cartilage against the drug Celebrex and placebos. Based on
x-rays of the subjects’ knees, the researchers concluded that none of the treatment groups fared any better than the placebo group, according to their report in Arthritis & Rheumatism.
A valid study? It helps to track the history of the GAIT study.
In 2006, the researchers reported how the different treatments affected symptoms of knee osteoarthritis after just six months. At the time, they wrote that there was no reduction in pain or swelling. But the study actually showed that people with the most pain had significant benefits from a combination of glucosamine and chondroitin supplements. In fact, these supplements led to greater pain relief than with the drug Celebrex. No conclusions could be drawn from people with mild osteoarthritic pain because such cases are difficult to assess.
In the latest GAIT report, the researchers acknowledged numerous problems with their data: the progression of osteoarthritis among people taking placebos was less than half of what had been anticipated. That alone would have skewed all data from the study, yet the researchers still argued that glucosamine and chondroitin were of no value.
My friend Jason Theodosakis, MD, author of The Arthritis Cure, told me that the study had three methodological problems – fatal flaws, if you will. First, the number of subjects remaining in the study was too small to achieve statistical significance. Second, the study ran for only two years, whereas other studies have shown that three years is the minimum time needed to demonstrate regeneration of knee cartilage. Third, the x-ray instruments used to measure joint-cartilage deterioration or growth was not sophisticated enough to make clinically meaningful measurements.
Despite all of these limitations, glucosamine hydrochloride supplements did lead to an improvement in joint cartilage compared with all of the other treatments. Inexplicably, however, people taking a combination of glucosamine and chondroitin experienced the greatest progression of joint damage. (I’m guessing, but it is conceivable that the patients taking glucosamine and chondroitin had such a great reduction in pain that they became too active physically, and in the process they injured their tender joints.)
Meanwhile, a separate article by the same researchers, published in Osteoarthritis and Cartilage, found that people taking chondroitin supplements benefited from substantial reductions in joint swelling. Essentially, the researchers published positive findings in one journal and negative findings in another journal. My head was left spinning.
A valid study? It helps to track the history of the GAIT study.
In 2006, the researchers reported how the different treatments affected symptoms of knee osteoarthritis after just six months. At the time, they wrote that there was no reduction in pain or swelling. But the study actually showed that people with the most pain had significant benefits from a combination of glucosamine and chondroitin supplements. In fact, these supplements led to greater pain relief than with the drug Celebrex. No conclusions could be drawn from people with mild osteoarthritic pain because such cases are difficult to assess.
In the latest GAIT report, the researchers acknowledged numerous problems with their data: the progression of osteoarthritis among people taking placebos was less than half of what had been anticipated. That alone would have skewed all data from the study, yet the researchers still argued that glucosamine and chondroitin were of no value.
My friend Jason Theodosakis, MD, author of The Arthritis Cure, told me that the study had three methodological problems – fatal flaws, if you will. First, the number of subjects remaining in the study was too small to achieve statistical significance. Second, the study ran for only two years, whereas other studies have shown that three years is the minimum time needed to demonstrate regeneration of knee cartilage. Third, the x-ray instruments used to measure joint-cartilage deterioration or growth was not sophisticated enough to make clinically meaningful measurements.
Despite all of these limitations, glucosamine hydrochloride supplements did lead to an improvement in joint cartilage compared with all of the other treatments. Inexplicably, however, people taking a combination of glucosamine and chondroitin experienced the greatest progression of joint damage. (I’m guessing, but it is conceivable that the patients taking glucosamine and chondroitin had such a great reduction in pain that they became too active physically, and in the process they injured their tender joints.)
Meanwhile, a separate article by the same researchers, published in Osteoarthritis and Cartilage, found that people taking chondroitin supplements benefited from substantial reductions in joint swelling. Essentially, the researchers published positive findings in one journal and negative findings in another journal. My head was left spinning.
Medical Journals, B Vitamins, and Cardiovascular Disease
Most medical journals claim to publish “peer-reviewed” articles, implying that the research has passed the muster of qualified physicians or researchers. In practice, many journal articles lack any substantial critical analysis before publication.
I believe this is one reason why so much poor-quality research, especially research critical of nutritional therapies, finds its way into print. Then, once in print, this junk science becomes an urban gospel – repeated in the form of poor advice to patients and in newspaper articles. The real peer review occurs after publication, often months later as letters to the editor, and without any newspaper headlines. Consider the following study as an example.
Earlier this year, researchers from the Harvard Medical School published a study in JAMA (Journal of the American Medical Association) in which female health professionals took either B-complex vitamins or placebos for an average of 7.3 years. The vitamin supplements lowered levels of homocysteine – a risk factor for cardiovascular diseases – but did not seem to reduce the risk of cardiovascular disease.
The study was touted as proof that B vitamins were worthless when it came to lowering the risk of heart disease and stroke. But four months later, in letters to the editor of JAMA, other physicians pointed out what should have been obvious early on: the study’s subjects, who were doctors and other medical professionals, were unlikely to be deficient in folic acid. In fact, the blood levels of the vitamin were normal in more than two-thirds of the subjects, meaning that they were less likely to benefit from supplements.
The original researchers acknowledged the critics’ comments and responded in part by writing that the folic acids’ lack of benefit “may not apply to populations with a greater prevalence of folate deficiency.” So, the vitamin might work after all.
The body’s use of folic acid is strongly influenced by genetics. Some genetic variations – an important variable – increase individual requirements for folic acid. These genetic variations were not assessed in this study, so it is very possible that folic acid supplements did benefit some people, but not others.
Earlier this year, researchers from the Harvard Medical School published a study in JAMA (Journal of the American Medical Association) in which female health professionals took either B-complex vitamins or placebos for an average of 7.3 years. The vitamin supplements lowered levels of homocysteine – a risk factor for cardiovascular diseases – but did not seem to reduce the risk of cardiovascular disease.
The study was touted as proof that B vitamins were worthless when it came to lowering the risk of heart disease and stroke. But four months later, in letters to the editor of JAMA, other physicians pointed out what should have been obvious early on: the study’s subjects, who were doctors and other medical professionals, were unlikely to be deficient in folic acid. In fact, the blood levels of the vitamin were normal in more than two-thirds of the subjects, meaning that they were less likely to benefit from supplements.
The original researchers acknowledged the critics’ comments and responded in part by writing that the folic acids’ lack of benefit “may not apply to populations with a greater prevalence of folate deficiency.” So, the vitamin might work after all.
The body’s use of folic acid is strongly influenced by genetics. Some genetic variations – an important variable – increase individual requirements for folic acid. These genetic variations were not assessed in this study, so it is very possible that folic acid supplements did benefit some people, but not others.
Wednesday, October 8, 2008
Vitamin D - Miracle Vitamin? Or Simply Correcting a Common Deficiency?
Vitamin D is on the fast-track toward nutritional sainthood – that is, of being declared a miracle vitamin.
Indeed, the research shows that vitamin D is required for healthy bones and to maintain the skeletal muscles that hold our bones in place. It helps prevent type 1 and type 2 diabetes. Vitamin D fights infections and may also have anti-depressant benefits. Vitamin D seems necessary for a maintaining a healthy heart. And perhaps most dramatically, vitamin D protects against many different types of cancer, including those of breast, colon, and prostate. All of these benefits point to the fundamental importance of vitamin D in health.
But I’ll argue for a moment that almost everyone is looking at the health benefits of vitamin D from the wrong perspective.
Studies have consistently shown that low levels of vitamin D (either marginal levels or outright deficiencies) are common among both sexes and all age groups, from infants through seniors. The consequences of inadequate vitamin D are nothing less than catastrophic, contributing to the risk of all the diseases that vitamin D supplements correct. As Evan Shute, M.D., once told me, vitamins prevent what they also cure.
The risk of a vitamin D deficiency can be reduced simply by taking a a capsule containing 1,000 to 2,000 IU daily. The benefits might seem miraculous, but they are not a true miracle. They are the result of correcting a single vitamin deficiency.
The conventional medical and dietetic view is that vitamin deficiency diseases were common through the 1940s, but that they are rare today. But this conventional view is wrong – often dead wrong for the people affected by such deficiencies.
It’s incredible that, in 2008, a lack of vitamin D is widespread, not just in the United States, but throughout Europe, Asia, and the rest of the world. And if we looked just a little harder, we would find deficiencies of other vitamins and minerals also to be common. Imagine much much better off people would be if somehow we managed to eliminate all vitamin deficiencies.
Indeed, the research shows that vitamin D is required for healthy bones and to maintain the skeletal muscles that hold our bones in place. It helps prevent type 1 and type 2 diabetes. Vitamin D fights infections and may also have anti-depressant benefits. Vitamin D seems necessary for a maintaining a healthy heart. And perhaps most dramatically, vitamin D protects against many different types of cancer, including those of breast, colon, and prostate. All of these benefits point to the fundamental importance of vitamin D in health.
But I’ll argue for a moment that almost everyone is looking at the health benefits of vitamin D from the wrong perspective.
Studies have consistently shown that low levels of vitamin D (either marginal levels or outright deficiencies) are common among both sexes and all age groups, from infants through seniors. The consequences of inadequate vitamin D are nothing less than catastrophic, contributing to the risk of all the diseases that vitamin D supplements correct. As Evan Shute, M.D., once told me, vitamins prevent what they also cure.
The risk of a vitamin D deficiency can be reduced simply by taking a a capsule containing 1,000 to 2,000 IU daily. The benefits might seem miraculous, but they are not a true miracle. They are the result of correcting a single vitamin deficiency.
The conventional medical and dietetic view is that vitamin deficiency diseases were common through the 1940s, but that they are rare today. But this conventional view is wrong – often dead wrong for the people affected by such deficiencies.
It’s incredible that, in 2008, a lack of vitamin D is widespread, not just in the United States, but throughout Europe, Asia, and the rest of the world. And if we looked just a little harder, we would find deficiencies of other vitamins and minerals also to be common. Imagine much much better off people would be if somehow we managed to eliminate all vitamin deficiencies.
Hospitals Are Some of the Most Dangerous Places
Ads touting the benefits of particular hospitals are common in big city newspapers, but on a recent day, I was struck by the sheer number of full-page ads for hospitals. In particular, one ad read: “For a healthy heart...eat properly, exercise daily and visit St. Francis, the hospital with more of the best cardiac specialists than any other hospital...”
What do hospitals have to do with disease prevention? Virtually nothing.
Visit St. Francis or any other hospital? Unless you need the ER, you may very well be putting your life at risk.
Years ago, while researching an article on the Navajo reservation, I learned that Native Americans had a specific word for hospitals – it translated to “the place where people go to die.”
The truth is that hospitals are among of the most dangerous places in our modern world, and you would do your best to stay out of hospitals. They’re a great place to contract “nosocomial infections,” a euphemism for infections contracted in hospitals. This doesn’t mean that hospitals and surgery don’t help a lot of people. They do, but there are serious downsides – e.g., death – while being hospitalized.
It turns out that whenever physicians go on either a strike or a work slowdown, the area’s death rate decreases.
I’m serious.
When physicians began a major work slowdown in Israel in 2000, the death rate decreased by 68 percent. When Israeli doctors went on strike for a month in 1973, the death rate during that month dropped by 50 percent. No one had seen such a dramatic decrease in death rates since the previous doctors’ strike 20 years before.
In 1976, doctors in Los Angeles went on strike to protest increases in malpractice insurance. You guessed it – the death rate decreased by 18 percent. That same year, doctors in Bogota, Columbia, also went on strike, and the death rate went down by 35 percent.
These aren't the ravings of a lunatic, believe me. Even the British Medical Journal has reported these amazing reductions in death rates when doctors go on strike and disrupt the treatment of people in hospitals.
The risk of death in hospitals also seems to relate to the magnitude of intervention, with more aggres-sive interventions increasing the odds of dying. In a recent study, published in the Annals of Internal Medicine, patients were more likely to die when treated entirely by critical-care physicians in intensive care units (ICUs), compared with patients treated entirely by noncritical-care physicians. You might argue that patients in ICUs are more seriously ill, but the researchers accounted for these differences in the severity of illness.
The problem lies with the pharmaceutical and surgical interventions that lie at the heart of modern medicine. Aggressive interventions are dangerous – and deadly – compared with more conservative therapies, such as nutritional medicine, especially for chronic diseases. Going to a hospital invites such interventions, and doctors often forget their Hippocratic Oath: first do no harm.
References: Siegel-Itzkovich J. BMJ, 2000;320:1561. Mendelsohn RS. Confessions of a Medical Heretic. Chicago: Contemporary Books, 1979:114. Levy MM. Annals of Internal Medicine, 2008;148:801-809.
What do hospitals have to do with disease prevention? Virtually nothing.
Visit St. Francis or any other hospital? Unless you need the ER, you may very well be putting your life at risk.
Years ago, while researching an article on the Navajo reservation, I learned that Native Americans had a specific word for hospitals – it translated to “the place where people go to die.”
The truth is that hospitals are among of the most dangerous places in our modern world, and you would do your best to stay out of hospitals. They’re a great place to contract “nosocomial infections,” a euphemism for infections contracted in hospitals. This doesn’t mean that hospitals and surgery don’t help a lot of people. They do, but there are serious downsides – e.g., death – while being hospitalized.
It turns out that whenever physicians go on either a strike or a work slowdown, the area’s death rate decreases.
I’m serious.
When physicians began a major work slowdown in Israel in 2000, the death rate decreased by 68 percent. When Israeli doctors went on strike for a month in 1973, the death rate during that month dropped by 50 percent. No one had seen such a dramatic decrease in death rates since the previous doctors’ strike 20 years before.
In 1976, doctors in Los Angeles went on strike to protest increases in malpractice insurance. You guessed it – the death rate decreased by 18 percent. That same year, doctors in Bogota, Columbia, also went on strike, and the death rate went down by 35 percent.
These aren't the ravings of a lunatic, believe me. Even the British Medical Journal has reported these amazing reductions in death rates when doctors go on strike and disrupt the treatment of people in hospitals.
The risk of death in hospitals also seems to relate to the magnitude of intervention, with more aggres-sive interventions increasing the odds of dying. In a recent study, published in the Annals of Internal Medicine, patients were more likely to die when treated entirely by critical-care physicians in intensive care units (ICUs), compared with patients treated entirely by noncritical-care physicians. You might argue that patients in ICUs are more seriously ill, but the researchers accounted for these differences in the severity of illness.
The problem lies with the pharmaceutical and surgical interventions that lie at the heart of modern medicine. Aggressive interventions are dangerous – and deadly – compared with more conservative therapies, such as nutritional medicine, especially for chronic diseases. Going to a hospital invites such interventions, and doctors often forget their Hippocratic Oath: first do no harm.
References: Siegel-Itzkovich J. BMJ, 2000;320:1561. Mendelsohn RS. Confessions of a Medical Heretic. Chicago: Contemporary Books, 1979:114. Levy MM. Annals of Internal Medicine, 2008;148:801-809.
Wednesday, August 20, 2008
Science That Distorts Research...And Setting The Record Straight
I was recently in England to lecture on nutrition and to sign copies of my book, Stop Prediabetes Now. (See www.stopprediabetesnow.com.) While there, another negative study on vitamins was published, one that claimed vitamin supplements increased the risk of death. The study’s findings were repeated there and around the world – uncritically. Some consumers, interviewed on TV, were actually afraid to continue taking their vitamin supplements.
The study, by Goren Bjelakovic, MD, and published via what is known as the Cochrane Database, was a rehash of his highly criticized study last year in the Journal of the American Medical Association. It was old news – and bad science.
Bjelakovic’s findings of a so-called significant increased risk of death from vitamins were not significant at all. The study wasn’t even a study – it was a statistical machination of 67 previously published studies, many of which had shown clear benefits from vitamin supplements. Bjelakovic focused on studies in which deaths occurred, choosing to ignore more than 400 studies (from his original pool of research) in which no deaths occurred. In poker, this is called stacking the deck, or outright cheating. Many of the subjects in the studies were seriously ill or terminal, vitamin dosages varied greatly, and the duration of supplement use ranged from a month to years. Bjelakovic had no idea of the causes of death, which might have included car accidents, interactions from prescription drugs, and children suffocating their terminally ill parents.
During the same week, I happened to visit the food hall at Harrod’s, the pricey London department store that prides itself on both quality and expensive goods. Curious, I looked at the ingredients list on tins of cookies. Incredibly, partially hydrogenated vegetable oils (i.e., trans fats) were the first or second ingredient in most of these products. Basically, Harrod’s magnificent food halls had turned into a hall of the worst kinds of junk food. Trans fats are arguably the most dangerous ingredient in processed foods.
Bjelakovic would have provided a far greater service if he had focused on the dangers of artificial food ingredients, such as the trans fats in Harrod’s cookies and hundreds of other common manufac-tured food products. When we take vitamin supple-ments, we often do so in part as a “countermeasure” to protect ourselves against some of the harmful additives whose presence is often not questioned at all.
The study, by Goren Bjelakovic, MD, and published via what is known as the Cochrane Database, was a rehash of his highly criticized study last year in the Journal of the American Medical Association. It was old news – and bad science.
Bjelakovic’s findings of a so-called significant increased risk of death from vitamins were not significant at all. The study wasn’t even a study – it was a statistical machination of 67 previously published studies, many of which had shown clear benefits from vitamin supplements. Bjelakovic focused on studies in which deaths occurred, choosing to ignore more than 400 studies (from his original pool of research) in which no deaths occurred. In poker, this is called stacking the deck, or outright cheating. Many of the subjects in the studies were seriously ill or terminal, vitamin dosages varied greatly, and the duration of supplement use ranged from a month to years. Bjelakovic had no idea of the causes of death, which might have included car accidents, interactions from prescription drugs, and children suffocating their terminally ill parents.
During the same week, I happened to visit the food hall at Harrod’s, the pricey London department store that prides itself on both quality and expensive goods. Curious, I looked at the ingredients list on tins of cookies. Incredibly, partially hydrogenated vegetable oils (i.e., trans fats) were the first or second ingredient in most of these products. Basically, Harrod’s magnificent food halls had turned into a hall of the worst kinds of junk food. Trans fats are arguably the most dangerous ingredient in processed foods.
Bjelakovic would have provided a far greater service if he had focused on the dangers of artificial food ingredients, such as the trans fats in Harrod’s cookies and hundreds of other common manufac-tured food products. When we take vitamin supple-ments, we often do so in part as a “countermeasure” to protect ourselves against some of the harmful additives whose presence is often not questioned at all.
A Safer Therapy for Brain Cancer
Politics aside, the diagnosis of brain cancer is awful. And although there are survivors, the results of conventional treatment are pretty dismal. When I heard that Senator Ted Kennedy had been diagnosed with malignant glioma, I immediately thought of a dear friend who was diagnosed in 2001 with malignant brain cancer. He remained pretty sharp mentally, aside from some forgetfulness, until shortly after he began radiation therapy, when he rapidly went downhill.
The current therapeutic vogue for brain cancer is the gamma knife, which is supposed to be a precise beam of radiation that destroys the tumor and nothing else. So they say. There is collateral damage – if not from the radiation striking normal cells, then from the creation of toxic necrotic disease as the cancer cells die. In 20 years, the gamma knife will probably be viewed as barbaric as we now view bloodletting.
A few days after Kennedy’s diagnosis made the headlines, I accidentally came across a medical review paper published last year, in which the author described cell, animal, and three small clinical (human) studies using gamma-linolenic acid (GLA) to treat gliomas and other types of brain cancers.
GLA is an anti-inflammatory plant oil sold at every health food store in the county. In the human studies, GLA was injected directly into the tumors daily for up to 20 days (obviously something you can’t do at home). Most of the people treated with GLA were alive and well almost three years after diagnosis. They experienced few if any side effects.
None of this means GLA is a cure for brain cancer, or any other type of cancer, for that matter. However, it is another very promising alternative and complementary therapy – one I suspect that Senator Kennedy’s doctors probably have never heard of. (By the way, I did email Senator Kennedy’s office about the GLA study.)
Skeptical? You can read the actual journal article for free by going to www.pubmed.gov, typing “Das UN glioma” (without the quotation marks) into the search box. Share this important article with your doctor and your friends. Maybe, just maybe, we’ll be able to encourage the use of a safe and nontoxic therapy for brain cancer.
Reference: Das UN. Medical Science Monitor, 2007;13: RA119-RA131.
The current therapeutic vogue for brain cancer is the gamma knife, which is supposed to be a precise beam of radiation that destroys the tumor and nothing else. So they say. There is collateral damage – if not from the radiation striking normal cells, then from the creation of toxic necrotic disease as the cancer cells die. In 20 years, the gamma knife will probably be viewed as barbaric as we now view bloodletting.
A few days after Kennedy’s diagnosis made the headlines, I accidentally came across a medical review paper published last year, in which the author described cell, animal, and three small clinical (human) studies using gamma-linolenic acid (GLA) to treat gliomas and other types of brain cancers.
GLA is an anti-inflammatory plant oil sold at every health food store in the county. In the human studies, GLA was injected directly into the tumors daily for up to 20 days (obviously something you can’t do at home). Most of the people treated with GLA were alive and well almost three years after diagnosis. They experienced few if any side effects.
None of this means GLA is a cure for brain cancer, or any other type of cancer, for that matter. However, it is another very promising alternative and complementary therapy – one I suspect that Senator Kennedy’s doctors probably have never heard of. (By the way, I did email Senator Kennedy’s office about the GLA study.)
Skeptical? You can read the actual journal article for free by going to www.pubmed.gov, typing “Das UN glioma” (without the quotation marks) into the search box. Share this important article with your doctor and your friends. Maybe, just maybe, we’ll be able to encourage the use of a safe and nontoxic therapy for brain cancer.
Reference: Das UN. Medical Science Monitor, 2007;13: RA119-RA131.
Wednesday, May 21, 2008
Nutricide and Pharmacide
As I look at the increasingly bizarre world around us, I think two new words seem appropriate: nutricide, the killing of people by serving them junk foods; and pharmacide, the killing of people by over-prescribing pharmaceutical drugs.
Read the labels of almost every supermarket food sold in a box, can, jar, bottle, or bag, and you’ll find that they contain far too many ingredients that serve large-scale processing but are slowly lethal to con-sumers ingesting them. I’m referring to various sugars, trans fats, interesterified fats, excess salt, and soybean oil as the top offenders. The fast-food companies are no better, serving up their breaded, deep-fried, hydrogenated goodies.
The folks at McDonald’s, KFC, Coca-Cola, Kraft, Campbell, and so many other makers of processed food are killing people by way of overweight, dia-betes, and heart disease. They’re guilty of nutricide.
Unfortunately, some so-called health food and natural food products aren’t much better. I recently attended the Natural Foods Expo show in Anaheim, California, where more than 3,000 companies showed their products to over 50,000 visitors. Many of the products were great – meats from organically raised animals, organically grown produce, and even relatively healthy snack foods.
But there were also too many attempts at feel-good knockoffs of conventional junk foods: “health food” soft drinks with as much sugar as a Pepsi, energy bars with as much sugar as a Snickers, chocolate soy milk with more sugar and calories than regular chocolate milk, ad nauseam (a term that seems particularly appropriate). And people wonder why two-thirds of Americans are overweight.
Meanwhile, the pharmaceutical industry has cooked up their own solution to the ills caused by all these unhealthy foods: heavily advertised drug panaceas that, in most cases, have side effects worse than the disease itself. Each year, more than 700,000 people get hospitalized because of adverse reactions to drugs, and more than 100,000 people in hospitals die from their medications, all of which are approved for use by the Food and Drug Administration. They’re all guilty of pharmacide.
Abram Hoffer, MD, PhD, a pioneer in nutritional medicine, recently pointed to the debate about whether anti-depressant drugs were really better than placebos. “This is a phony debate, almost like trying to figure out how many angels are dancing on the head of a pin,” he told me. “Even if the drugs are 10 percent better, they are so much more toxic than any placebo that a placebo should be preferred.”
Read the labels of almost every supermarket food sold in a box, can, jar, bottle, or bag, and you’ll find that they contain far too many ingredients that serve large-scale processing but are slowly lethal to con-sumers ingesting them. I’m referring to various sugars, trans fats, interesterified fats, excess salt, and soybean oil as the top offenders. The fast-food companies are no better, serving up their breaded, deep-fried, hydrogenated goodies.
The folks at McDonald’s, KFC, Coca-Cola, Kraft, Campbell, and so many other makers of processed food are killing people by way of overweight, dia-betes, and heart disease. They’re guilty of nutricide.
Unfortunately, some so-called health food and natural food products aren’t much better. I recently attended the Natural Foods Expo show in Anaheim, California, where more than 3,000 companies showed their products to over 50,000 visitors. Many of the products were great – meats from organically raised animals, organically grown produce, and even relatively healthy snack foods.
But there were also too many attempts at feel-good knockoffs of conventional junk foods: “health food” soft drinks with as much sugar as a Pepsi, energy bars with as much sugar as a Snickers, chocolate soy milk with more sugar and calories than regular chocolate milk, ad nauseam (a term that seems particularly appropriate). And people wonder why two-thirds of Americans are overweight.
Meanwhile, the pharmaceutical industry has cooked up their own solution to the ills caused by all these unhealthy foods: heavily advertised drug panaceas that, in most cases, have side effects worse than the disease itself. Each year, more than 700,000 people get hospitalized because of adverse reactions to drugs, and more than 100,000 people in hospitals die from their medications, all of which are approved for use by the Food and Drug Administration. They’re all guilty of pharmacide.
Abram Hoffer, MD, PhD, a pioneer in nutritional medicine, recently pointed to the debate about whether anti-depressant drugs were really better than placebos. “This is a phony debate, almost like trying to figure out how many angels are dancing on the head of a pin,” he told me. “Even if the drugs are 10 percent better, they are so much more toxic than any placebo that a placebo should be preferred.”
Thursday, May 8, 2008
Redefining the Meaning of Nutritional Deficiencies
Many of us were taught that vitamin deficiencies were horrible diseases such as scurvy, beriberi, and pellagra – each often characterized by the body literally falling apart. Relatively common 100 years ago, these diseases are now considered rare.
But it is a mistake to consider these "classic" deficiency diseases the first sign of compromised nutrition. Rather, these diseases consist of the final burst of symptoms – what some people in medicine refer to as "total system failure" – before death.
It is equally foolish to believe that nutritional deficiencies are rare today. Often the signs of marginal nutritional intake or early deficiency are more difficult to assess, in large part because their symptoms may be vague and because health-care professions simply don't bother investigating them.
For example, a vitamin C-deprivation study found that the first signs of deficiency were not those of scurvy, but rather irritability and fatigue – two extremely common symptoms. That should not come as a surprise because 30 to 48 percent of Americans do not consume the "recommended" amounts of vitamin C, indicating that their nutritional status is marginal at best.
Studies show similar patterns with other nutrients. A study of magnesium intake in the elderly found that one-fourth of subjects did not consume the officially recommended daily amounts. Similarly, 93 percent of Americans do not consume the recommended levels of vitamin E. In another study, researchers reported that 98 percent of patients hospitalized for hip fractures were either deficient or had marginal blood levels of vitamin D.
Vitamins and minerals directly or indirectly play roles in the thousands of biochemical reactions that occur in our bodies every second of the day. Without them, these chemical pr ocesses become sluggish or cease. The situation is analogous to using yeast to make dough rise. If yeast is not present, the dough does not rise to make bread.
Yet the average person, subsisting on fast foods and convenience foods (instead of fresh wholesome foods), most likely has a marginal intake of many vitamins and minerals. As chemical reactions slow down, any number of symptoms are likely to emerge. The situation is further complicated by the use of pharmaceutical medications, nearly all of which interfere with nutrient absorption or utilization.
It makes no sense to wait until the symptoms of nutritional deficiencies become fulminate. It's far more fascinating and exciting to discover how nutritional deficiencies and imbalances can cause a wide variety of otherwise inexplicable symptoms.
But it is a mistake to consider these "classic" deficiency diseases the first sign of compromised nutrition. Rather, these diseases consist of the final burst of symptoms – what some people in medicine refer to as "total system failure" – before death.
It is equally foolish to believe that nutritional deficiencies are rare today. Often the signs of marginal nutritional intake or early deficiency are more difficult to assess, in large part because their symptoms may be vague and because health-care professions simply don't bother investigating them.
For example, a vitamin C-deprivation study found that the first signs of deficiency were not those of scurvy, but rather irritability and fatigue – two extremely common symptoms. That should not come as a surprise because 30 to 48 percent of Americans do not consume the "recommended" amounts of vitamin C, indicating that their nutritional status is marginal at best.
Studies show similar patterns with other nutrients. A study of magnesium intake in the elderly found that one-fourth of subjects did not consume the officially recommended daily amounts. Similarly, 93 percent of Americans do not consume the recommended levels of vitamin E. In another study, researchers reported that 98 percent of patients hospitalized for hip fractures were either deficient or had marginal blood levels of vitamin D.
Vitamins and minerals directly or indirectly play roles in the thousands of biochemical reactions that occur in our bodies every second of the day. Without them, these chemical pr ocesses become sluggish or cease. The situation is analogous to using yeast to make dough rise. If yeast is not present, the dough does not rise to make bread.
Yet the average person, subsisting on fast foods and convenience foods (instead of fresh wholesome foods), most likely has a marginal intake of many vitamins and minerals. As chemical reactions slow down, any number of symptoms are likely to emerge. The situation is further complicated by the use of pharmaceutical medications, nearly all of which interfere with nutrient absorption or utilization.
It makes no sense to wait until the symptoms of nutritional deficiencies become fulminate. It's far more fascinating and exciting to discover how nutritional deficiencies and imbalances can cause a wide variety of otherwise inexplicable symptoms.
Wednesday, April 30, 2008
One Reason Why Organic Foods Are More Nutritious
For years, dietitians, pesticide makers, junk food companies, and Big Agriculture have argued that organic foods are a waste of money. They often point to the enormous crop yields – i.e., supposed superiority – of conventional corporate farming.
Organic farming is based on sustainable agricultural methods, in which soil nutrients are replenished with natural fertilizers and chemical pesticides are avoided.
A few small studies have strongly suggested that organic foods have higher levels of many nutrients. Several years ago, researchers found that plants increased their production of antioxidants to protect against weather and insect stresses. Pesticides obviate the need for these natural defenses, resulting in lower antioxidant levels.
New research points to a fundamental flaw in high-volume farming. Biochemist Donald R. Davis, PhD, of the University of Texas, Austin, and his colleagues analyzed levels of 13 nutrients in 43 food crops between 1950 and 1999. They used U.S. Department of Agriculture data for their comparison.
Although overall crop yields increased many times during this time, levels of six nutrients decreased. For example, protein declined by 6 percent, and vitamin B2 went down by 38 percent. Calcium, phosphorus, iron, and vitamin C also had substantial declines.
After further investigation, Davis and his colleagues attributed the decrease in nutrient levels to a “dilution effect.” Although plant yields per acre increased, the root systems of plants were not able to improve their assimilation of nitrogen and minerals, which are needed to make protein and vitamins. In other words, growing more plants per acre is equivalent to having more mouths for the soil to feed. That means smaller portions of nutrients per plant.
The lesson? You can’t fool Mother Nature.
Organic farming is based on sustainable agricultural methods, in which soil nutrients are replenished with natural fertilizers and chemical pesticides are avoided.
A few small studies have strongly suggested that organic foods have higher levels of many nutrients. Several years ago, researchers found that plants increased their production of antioxidants to protect against weather and insect stresses. Pesticides obviate the need for these natural defenses, resulting in lower antioxidant levels.
New research points to a fundamental flaw in high-volume farming. Biochemist Donald R. Davis, PhD, of the University of Texas, Austin, and his colleagues analyzed levels of 13 nutrients in 43 food crops between 1950 and 1999. They used U.S. Department of Agriculture data for their comparison.
Although overall crop yields increased many times during this time, levels of six nutrients decreased. For example, protein declined by 6 percent, and vitamin B2 went down by 38 percent. Calcium, phosphorus, iron, and vitamin C also had substantial declines.
After further investigation, Davis and his colleagues attributed the decrease in nutrient levels to a “dilution effect.” Although plant yields per acre increased, the root systems of plants were not able to improve their assimilation of nitrogen and minerals, which are needed to make protein and vitamins. In other words, growing more plants per acre is equivalent to having more mouths for the soil to feed. That means smaller portions of nutrients per plant.
The lesson? You can’t fool Mother Nature.
Wednesday, April 9, 2008
A Sea of Pills — Natural and Unnatural
Too often, health magazines and alternative medical journals read a little too much like conventional medical journals. The parallel is odd, even uncomfortable.
Most medical journals publish drug ads for a variety of ills, along with articles describing the benefits of various drugs. The ads are doctor-oriented versions of the commercials you frequently see on television – ads to help you sleep better, have less heartburn, lower cholesterol, improve your mood, be less shy, and have better erections.
The pitch is not just for the seriously ill. The underlying message is often based on arousing your fear of disease, discomfort, or, as the case may be, a soft penis. Take a lot of pills and all your problems will disappear, assuming that the side effects don't produce new problems.
Health magazines and alternative medical journals often follow a similar tack. An ad in a recent consumer health magazine pitched products for blood sugar, eye health, sports injuries, hormone replacement, bone health, immunity, and prostate health – on a single page!
Articles in some of the alternative medical journals aren't much better. They commonly include long lists of vitamins, minerals, and herbs – a natural polypharmacy for preventing and reversing the same health problems described in conventional journals.
Granted, I think there's research behind these supplements, and they're safer than drugs. But when both conventional and alternative recommendations point only to pills, something is seriously wrong.
We live in a pill-oriented society. We've been bred to believe that a pill, whether natural or synthetic, is the solution for our health problems. It's easy to forget that the foods we eat – wholesome versus junk – is of fundamental importance. After all, a dinner of fish and veggies provides a diversity of nutrients not found in any supplement. Similarly, physical activity and stress reduction foster good physical and mental health.
I'm a firm believer in the health benefits of nutritional supplements. The scientific evidence behind their use is sound. But let's be careful to not use supplements only as a natural way of mimicking drugs. Fostering good health demands that we eat, not just swallow.
Most medical journals publish drug ads for a variety of ills, along with articles describing the benefits of various drugs. The ads are doctor-oriented versions of the commercials you frequently see on television – ads to help you sleep better, have less heartburn, lower cholesterol, improve your mood, be less shy, and have better erections.
The pitch is not just for the seriously ill. The underlying message is often based on arousing your fear of disease, discomfort, or, as the case may be, a soft penis. Take a lot of pills and all your problems will disappear, assuming that the side effects don't produce new problems.
Health magazines and alternative medical journals often follow a similar tack. An ad in a recent consumer health magazine pitched products for blood sugar, eye health, sports injuries, hormone replacement, bone health, immunity, and prostate health – on a single page!
Articles in some of the alternative medical journals aren't much better. They commonly include long lists of vitamins, minerals, and herbs – a natural polypharmacy for preventing and reversing the same health problems described in conventional journals.
Granted, I think there's research behind these supplements, and they're safer than drugs. But when both conventional and alternative recommendations point only to pills, something is seriously wrong.
We live in a pill-oriented society. We've been bred to believe that a pill, whether natural or synthetic, is the solution for our health problems. It's easy to forget that the foods we eat – wholesome versus junk – is of fundamental importance. After all, a dinner of fish and veggies provides a diversity of nutrients not found in any supplement. Similarly, physical activity and stress reduction foster good physical and mental health.
I'm a firm believer in the health benefits of nutritional supplements. The scientific evidence behind their use is sound. But let's be careful to not use supplements only as a natural way of mimicking drugs. Fostering good health demands that we eat, not just swallow.
Tuesday, April 1, 2008
Does Cholesterol Matter? Apparently Only If You're On a Cholesterol-Lowering Drug
The makers of Zetia and Vytorin (which combines Zetia and Zocor) recently announced that their aggressively advertised cholesterol-lowering drugs failed to slow the development of fatty plaque in arteries. In fact, the drugs actually promote the formation of plaque in arteries, which fuels heart disease and increases the risk of a heart attack. The announcement – in a news release, not a medical journal – came after long delays in reporting the findings of their study.
Why the delays? Follow the money. Sales of the two drugs added up to $5 billion in revenues in 2007.
The news release was the first of several fascinating and bizarre reports on Zetia and Vytorin. Even though the drugs don’t prevent heart disease, the American Heart Association quickly issued an official news release in defense of the drugs.
If you’re confused by that, just follow the money trail again. According to an article in the New York Times, the American Heart Association gets $2 million a year from Merck/Schering-Plough Pharmaceuticals, the pharmaceutical group that markets Vytorin.
The failure of this and other recent cholesterol-lowering drug trials has renewed a long-simmering debate about the role of cholesterol in heart disease. Cholesterol is a symptom -- get that, a symptom -- not a cause of heart disease, and Vytorin and other drugs merely alter a symptom. In fact, cholesterol has long been known as only a weak indicator of heart disease risk (American Journal of Epidemiology, 1977;105:281-9). Half of the people who have heart attacks have normal cholesterol levels.
What then causes heart disease? The answer is a variety of factors, most of which are no-brainers, such as prediabetes and overweight, which result from excess intake of refined sugars, processed sugar-like carbohyrates, and trans fats. This dietary pattern elevates blood sugar, insulin – and, yes, cholesterol. Even the oft-recommended high-carb diet for preventing heart disease raises cholesterol and triglyceride levels. That's because, in most people, elevated cholesterol and triglyceride levels reflect sugar and carb intake, not fats.
If all this isn’t strange enough, consider one more recent report. The average cholesterol level of Americans is now lower than it was back in 1960 because of all the cholesterol-lowering drugs that have been prescribed. At the same time, two-thirds of Americans are now overweight –- the number one risk factor for diabetes and heart disease. In effect, Rome is burning while medicine fiddles with cholesterol.
Why the delays? Follow the money. Sales of the two drugs added up to $5 billion in revenues in 2007.
The news release was the first of several fascinating and bizarre reports on Zetia and Vytorin. Even though the drugs don’t prevent heart disease, the American Heart Association quickly issued an official news release in defense of the drugs.
If you’re confused by that, just follow the money trail again. According to an article in the New York Times, the American Heart Association gets $2 million a year from Merck/Schering-Plough Pharmaceuticals, the pharmaceutical group that markets Vytorin.
The failure of this and other recent cholesterol-lowering drug trials has renewed a long-simmering debate about the role of cholesterol in heart disease. Cholesterol is a symptom -- get that, a symptom -- not a cause of heart disease, and Vytorin and other drugs merely alter a symptom. In fact, cholesterol has long been known as only a weak indicator of heart disease risk (American Journal of Epidemiology, 1977;105:281-9). Half of the people who have heart attacks have normal cholesterol levels.
What then causes heart disease? The answer is a variety of factors, most of which are no-brainers, such as prediabetes and overweight, which result from excess intake of refined sugars, processed sugar-like carbohyrates, and trans fats. This dietary pattern elevates blood sugar, insulin – and, yes, cholesterol. Even the oft-recommended high-carb diet for preventing heart disease raises cholesterol and triglyceride levels. That's because, in most people, elevated cholesterol and triglyceride levels reflect sugar and carb intake, not fats.
If all this isn’t strange enough, consider one more recent report. The average cholesterol level of Americans is now lower than it was back in 1960 because of all the cholesterol-lowering drugs that have been prescribed. At the same time, two-thirds of Americans are now overweight –- the number one risk factor for diabetes and heart disease. In effect, Rome is burning while medicine fiddles with cholesterol.
Saturday, March 22, 2008
The Tipping Point - Applied to Nutrition and Health
Each of us, as individuals, has our nutritional tipping point. And societies as a whole also have their nutritional tipping points as well.
The term “tipping point” comes from the field of epidemiology. It originally referred to when epidemics rapidly accelerated, or reached a tipping point at which large numbers of people were affected. Malcolm Gladwell writes about such phenomena in his book, The Tipping Point.
Thirty years ago, when I first met with Abram Hoffer, MD, PhD, one of the pioneers in nutritional medicine, we talked a little about how poor nutrition might set the stage for a societal catastrophe. With great foresight, he said that a tipping point would come when our society has more sick people than healthy people to take care of them. That situation would lead to social and economic collapse.
People often reach a tipping point in their moods, such as when they are overwhelmed by stress or explode in anger. There are also tipping points in the progression of diseases, such as when cardiovascular disease reaches a crescendo known as a heart attack or when a tumor becomes clinically recognizable, or terminal.
People seem to function – perhaps get by – even though their nutritional intake may be marginal. They may not feel their best, a sign of less than optimal nutritional biochemistry. Many studies refer to their subjects as being “apparently healthy” because they have no overt signs of serious disease. But “apparently healthy” often means that they have not yet reached their nutritional tipping point.
Fatigue, one of the most common of all symptoms, may be a sign that we’ve hit our tipping point for poor nutrition and too much stress. We end up having too many things to do, but without the nutritional support to fortify us. Prediabetes is another tipping point, as would be any fulminant disease. The question is: what is your tipping point, and what are you doing to avoid it?
The term “tipping point” comes from the field of epidemiology. It originally referred to when epidemics rapidly accelerated, or reached a tipping point at which large numbers of people were affected. Malcolm Gladwell writes about such phenomena in his book, The Tipping Point.
Thirty years ago, when I first met with Abram Hoffer, MD, PhD, one of the pioneers in nutritional medicine, we talked a little about how poor nutrition might set the stage for a societal catastrophe. With great foresight, he said that a tipping point would come when our society has more sick people than healthy people to take care of them. That situation would lead to social and economic collapse.
People often reach a tipping point in their moods, such as when they are overwhelmed by stress or explode in anger. There are also tipping points in the progression of diseases, such as when cardiovascular disease reaches a crescendo known as a heart attack or when a tumor becomes clinically recognizable, or terminal.
People seem to function – perhaps get by – even though their nutritional intake may be marginal. They may not feel their best, a sign of less than optimal nutritional biochemistry. Many studies refer to their subjects as being “apparently healthy” because they have no overt signs of serious disease. But “apparently healthy” often means that they have not yet reached their nutritional tipping point.
Fatigue, one of the most common of all symptoms, may be a sign that we’ve hit our tipping point for poor nutrition and too much stress. We end up having too many things to do, but without the nutritional support to fortify us. Prediabetes is another tipping point, as would be any fulminant disease. The question is: what is your tipping point, and what are you doing to avoid it?
Tackling the High Cost of Health Care
Any way you look at the cost of health care – or rather, disease care – in the United States, it's extraordinarily expensive. If you pay your own health and medical insurance, or at least contribute to its cost through your employer, you know that the premiums and copayments are always increasing. And the cost of health care is going to get much worse.
Different experts come up with different numbers, but they're all pretty chilling. In one analysis, health-care spending is expected to double from $2 billion annually to $4 billion annually in just 10 years. That amount would add up to one out of every five dollars spent in the United States. Another analysis projects that more than $8 billion dollars will be spent just to cover the new Medicare prescription drug plan over the next four years. I know, and you probably do as well, many people who take five to 10 prescription medications each day, putting them and our nation at risk of financial ruin.
There are many reasons behind these enormous increases in health-care spending. One is the aging of the population. Another is the aggressive advertising by pharmaceutical companies to sell their proprietary drugs. Still another is the competitive hospital environment – though many hospitals are technically nonprofit, they seek earnings and market share the way any for-profit corporation does. More disturbing, the number of for-profit hospitals is increasing rapidly, whereas the number of nonprofit hospitals is quickly shrinking.
With so many businesses and organizations intent on profiting from disease care, genuine efforts at prevention get the short shrift. After all, many businesses would suffer financially if large numbers of people got healthier and didn't need drugs and medical services. Yet our financial security, as individuals, families, and a nation, depends on significantly reducing the costs of medical care.
Improving eating habits and encouraging people to take dietary supplements to prevent (as well as to treat) disease is a sensible, low-cost approach. Nutrients are cheaper than drugs, and they correct the underlying causes of disease, not just its symptoms. With this credible approach to preventing disease, drugs and hospitalization would be reserved for when there is no reasonable alternative. It would certainly require a retooling of our economy, one that would probably be greater than retooling from manufacturing to high tech, but the economic payoff would (along with our health) would be impressive: healthier people are more productive people.
Spread the word. Explain this to your friends, your employer, and your insurer, and convey these thoughts to your senators and congressman. We have to start sometime, and there's no better time than now. The alternative, sometime in the future, will be economic collapse.
Different experts come up with different numbers, but they're all pretty chilling. In one analysis, health-care spending is expected to double from $2 billion annually to $4 billion annually in just 10 years. That amount would add up to one out of every five dollars spent in the United States. Another analysis projects that more than $8 billion dollars will be spent just to cover the new Medicare prescription drug plan over the next four years. I know, and you probably do as well, many people who take five to 10 prescription medications each day, putting them and our nation at risk of financial ruin.
There are many reasons behind these enormous increases in health-care spending. One is the aging of the population. Another is the aggressive advertising by pharmaceutical companies to sell their proprietary drugs. Still another is the competitive hospital environment – though many hospitals are technically nonprofit, they seek earnings and market share the way any for-profit corporation does. More disturbing, the number of for-profit hospitals is increasing rapidly, whereas the number of nonprofit hospitals is quickly shrinking.
With so many businesses and organizations intent on profiting from disease care, genuine efforts at prevention get the short shrift. After all, many businesses would suffer financially if large numbers of people got healthier and didn't need drugs and medical services. Yet our financial security, as individuals, families, and a nation, depends on significantly reducing the costs of medical care.
Improving eating habits and encouraging people to take dietary supplements to prevent (as well as to treat) disease is a sensible, low-cost approach. Nutrients are cheaper than drugs, and they correct the underlying causes of disease, not just its symptoms. With this credible approach to preventing disease, drugs and hospitalization would be reserved for when there is no reasonable alternative. It would certainly require a retooling of our economy, one that would probably be greater than retooling from manufacturing to high tech, but the economic payoff would (along with our health) would be impressive: healthier people are more productive people.
Spread the word. Explain this to your friends, your employer, and your insurer, and convey these thoughts to your senators and congressman. We have to start sometime, and there's no better time than now. The alternative, sometime in the future, will be economic collapse.
Thursday, March 6, 2008
About That Study on the "Dangers" of Lowering Blood Sugar
You may have heard about the U.S. government-funded diabetes study that was abruptly shut down in February 2008. The study involved the aggressive medical (not nutritional) treatment to lower blood sugar in people with diabetes.
The idea behind the study was that reducing blood sugar levels to near normal levels would improve the health of people with diabetes. It turned out that people in the study with the lowest blood sugar levels were far more likely to die from a heart attack, com-pared with people who were not treated as aggres-sively. Newspaper stories questioned the rationale of lowering blood sugar too much in people with diabetes.
Meanwhile, a second and similar study, directed by Australian researchers, did not find a higher risk of death. However, the second study did not seek to lower blood sugar as much and, based on initial reports, and did not involve either as many prescrip-tion drugs or high doses.
Make no bones about it: elevated blood sugar is dangerous, and even modest increases in blood sugar increase the risk of heart attack.
But the researchers in the American study used a panoply of drugs – not nutrition – to reduce blood sugar. The patients’ blood sugar did in fact decrease, but the drug treatment simply modified a symptom – high blood sugar – while the underlying disease process continued.
The fatalities may have been further complicated by the interactions of the various drugs. The patients were given a variety of FDA-approved drugs for treating diabetes, including metformin, thiazoli-dinediones (e.g., rosiglitazone), sulfonylureas, exanatide, acarbose, and insulin. Insulin alone can increase the risk of a heart attack. One doctor was quoted in the New York Times as saying that the treatment was “brutal” and had little relevance to real-world treatment.
This was yet another unfortunate – and deadly – study showing that more drugs are more dangerous than fewer drugs. So much for the Hippocratic Oath of first doing no harm. The ideal approach to treating diabetes (and prediabetes) is through nutrition and supplements. I’m yet to hear of anyone, diabetic or not, dying from good eating habits.
(To read more on the safe prevention and reversal of prediabetes, get excerpts from my book, Stop Prediabetes Now, at www.nutritionreporter.com)
The idea behind the study was that reducing blood sugar levels to near normal levels would improve the health of people with diabetes. It turned out that people in the study with the lowest blood sugar levels were far more likely to die from a heart attack, com-pared with people who were not treated as aggres-sively. Newspaper stories questioned the rationale of lowering blood sugar too much in people with diabetes.
Meanwhile, a second and similar study, directed by Australian researchers, did not find a higher risk of death. However, the second study did not seek to lower blood sugar as much and, based on initial reports, and did not involve either as many prescrip-tion drugs or high doses.
Make no bones about it: elevated blood sugar is dangerous, and even modest increases in blood sugar increase the risk of heart attack.
But the researchers in the American study used a panoply of drugs – not nutrition – to reduce blood sugar. The patients’ blood sugar did in fact decrease, but the drug treatment simply modified a symptom – high blood sugar – while the underlying disease process continued.
The fatalities may have been further complicated by the interactions of the various drugs. The patients were given a variety of FDA-approved drugs for treating diabetes, including metformin, thiazoli-dinediones (e.g., rosiglitazone), sulfonylureas, exanatide, acarbose, and insulin. Insulin alone can increase the risk of a heart attack. One doctor was quoted in the New York Times as saying that the treatment was “brutal” and had little relevance to real-world treatment.
This was yet another unfortunate – and deadly – study showing that more drugs are more dangerous than fewer drugs. So much for the Hippocratic Oath of first doing no harm. The ideal approach to treating diabetes (and prediabetes) is through nutrition and supplements. I’m yet to hear of anyone, diabetic or not, dying from good eating habits.
(To read more on the safe prevention and reversal of prediabetes, get excerpts from my book, Stop Prediabetes Now, at www.nutritionreporter.com)
Tuesday, February 26, 2008
Intravenous Vitamin C Gaining More Attention for Its Cancer Fighting Benefits
This post could save your life – or the life of someone close to you.
Thirty years ago, Nobel laureate Linus Pauling advocated high-dose vitamin C as part of the treatment of cancer. His recommendations were based on a small number of patients who had been given either oral or intravenous (IV) vitamin C. Subsequent clinical trials at the Mayo Clinic failed to demonstrate any benefits from oral vitamin C, and the therapy was rejected by conventional medicine.
Recent experimental studies, however, have found that IV vitamin C can raise blood levels of vitamin C 25 to 70 times higher than those achievable through oral supplements. That’s significant because such high doses are toxic to cancer cells, but not normal cells.
To explain, large amounts of oral vitamin C increase blood levels up to 70 to 220 μmol/L – far less than the 1,000 μmol/L needed to destroy many types of cancer cells. With IV vitamin C, blood concentrations can be increased up to 14,000 μmol/L of blood. In a report in the Canadian Medical Association Journal, Mark Levine, MD, PhD, of the U.S. National Institutes of Health, and his colleagues described three people treated with IV vitamin C and other supplements. Two of the patients are still alive, and the third (a long-standing cigarette smoker) lived much longer than expected.
One of the cases was a 49-year-old man diagnosed in 1996 with a primary bladder cancer that was starting to metastasize. The tumors were removed surgically, and the patient declined chemo and radiation therapy. The patient decided to receive IV vitamin C at the Bright Spot for Health, a nutritional medicine clinic in Wichita, Kansas. He received two 30-gram IVs weekly for three months, followed by 30 grams once every month or so for four years. “Now, nine years after diagnosis, the patient is in good health with no symptoms of recurrence or metastasis,” wrote Levine and his coauthors.
In a separate report published in the Puerto Rico Health Sciences Journal, doctors described the safety of high-dose IV vitamin C in 24 late-stage terminal cancer patients. The patients were given 10,000 to 50,000 mg of IV vitamin C daily. Most had been deficient in vitamin C before treatment, and side effects were infrequent and mild.
Levine and his colleagues believe that vitamin C produces large amounts of hydrogen peroxide, a potent generator of free radicals, inside tumors. The mechanism is similar to conventional chemotherapy, but without the side effects.
However, a recent report in the journal Nature suggests another mechanism to vitamin C’s benefits. Cancer cells produce large amounts of the enzyme lysyl oxidase, which promotes metastasis. However, an earlier study found that vitamin C inhibited the activity of lysyl oxidase.
If you'd like to read the scientific basis for what I've written, check out the references below at www.pubmed.gov. For more general information on nutrition and health, explore my website at www.nutritionreporter.com
Scientific References: Padayatty SJ, Riordan HD, Hewitt SM, et al. Intravenously administered vitamin C as cancer therapy: three cases. CMAJ, 2006;174:937-942. Riordan HD, Casciari JJ, Gonzalez MJ, et al. A pilot clinical study of continuous intravenous ascorbate in terminal cancer patients. Puerto Rico Health Sciences Journal, 2005;24:269-276. Erler JT, Bennewith KL, Nicolau M, et al. Lysyl oxidase is essential for hypoxia- induced metastasis. Nature, 2006;440:1222-1226. Kuroyanagi M, Shimamura E, Kim M, et al. Effects of L-ascorbic acide on lysyl oxidase in the formation of collagen cross-links. Bioscience, Biotechnology, and Biochemistry, 2002;66:2077-2082.
Thirty years ago, Nobel laureate Linus Pauling advocated high-dose vitamin C as part of the treatment of cancer. His recommendations were based on a small number of patients who had been given either oral or intravenous (IV) vitamin C. Subsequent clinical trials at the Mayo Clinic failed to demonstrate any benefits from oral vitamin C, and the therapy was rejected by conventional medicine.
Recent experimental studies, however, have found that IV vitamin C can raise blood levels of vitamin C 25 to 70 times higher than those achievable through oral supplements. That’s significant because such high doses are toxic to cancer cells, but not normal cells.
To explain, large amounts of oral vitamin C increase blood levels up to 70 to 220 μmol/L – far less than the 1,000 μmol/L needed to destroy many types of cancer cells. With IV vitamin C, blood concentrations can be increased up to 14,000 μmol/L of blood. In a report in the Canadian Medical Association Journal, Mark Levine, MD, PhD, of the U.S. National Institutes of Health, and his colleagues described three people treated with IV vitamin C and other supplements. Two of the patients are still alive, and the third (a long-standing cigarette smoker) lived much longer than expected.
One of the cases was a 49-year-old man diagnosed in 1996 with a primary bladder cancer that was starting to metastasize. The tumors were removed surgically, and the patient declined chemo and radiation therapy. The patient decided to receive IV vitamin C at the Bright Spot for Health, a nutritional medicine clinic in Wichita, Kansas. He received two 30-gram IVs weekly for three months, followed by 30 grams once every month or so for four years. “Now, nine years after diagnosis, the patient is in good health with no symptoms of recurrence or metastasis,” wrote Levine and his coauthors.
In a separate report published in the Puerto Rico Health Sciences Journal, doctors described the safety of high-dose IV vitamin C in 24 late-stage terminal cancer patients. The patients were given 10,000 to 50,000 mg of IV vitamin C daily. Most had been deficient in vitamin C before treatment, and side effects were infrequent and mild.
Levine and his colleagues believe that vitamin C produces large amounts of hydrogen peroxide, a potent generator of free radicals, inside tumors. The mechanism is similar to conventional chemotherapy, but without the side effects.
However, a recent report in the journal Nature suggests another mechanism to vitamin C’s benefits. Cancer cells produce large amounts of the enzyme lysyl oxidase, which promotes metastasis. However, an earlier study found that vitamin C inhibited the activity of lysyl oxidase.
If you'd like to read the scientific basis for what I've written, check out the references below at www.pubmed.gov. For more general information on nutrition and health, explore my website at www.nutritionreporter.com
Scientific References: Padayatty SJ, Riordan HD, Hewitt SM, et al. Intravenously administered vitamin C as cancer therapy: three cases. CMAJ, 2006;174:937-942. Riordan HD, Casciari JJ, Gonzalez MJ, et al. A pilot clinical study of continuous intravenous ascorbate in terminal cancer patients. Puerto Rico Health Sciences Journal, 2005;24:269-276. Erler JT, Bennewith KL, Nicolau M, et al. Lysyl oxidase is essential for hypoxia- induced metastasis. Nature, 2006;440:1222-1226. Kuroyanagi M, Shimamura E, Kim M, et al. Effects of L-ascorbic acide on lysyl oxidase in the formation of collagen cross-links. Bioscience, Biotechnology, and Biochemistry, 2002;66:2077-2082.
Sunday, February 10, 2008
Maintaining an Acid-Alkaline Balance
When I first heard, years ago, that acidic foods could somehow contribute to disease, I thought the idea was pretty far fetched. It struck me as a particularly odd prohibition against eating certain foods.
Recently, I became a believer. It turns out that acid and alkaline foods do have a bearing on health, but that the science has often been misunderstood or misrepresented. (See the article that follows.) The body functions best at a neutral or slightly alkaline pH. The problem has nothing to do with whether foods are acidic or alkaline per se. Rather, it’s about whether foods have an acid or alkaline effect after digestion and when they reach the kidneys.
Because the body strives to maintain a neutral pH, acid-yielding foods trigger the release of calcium and magnesium from bone and ammonia from the protein in muscles. The calcium, magnesium, and ammonia neutralize the acid, but they do so at a serious price: both bones and muscles weaken, over the long term setting the stage of osteoporosis and age-related loss of muscle mass and strength.
The principal acid-generating foods are animal proteins, grains, dairy products, and any food with a lot of added salt. The salt yields both sodium and chloride, which shift the body toward an acidic pH. Large amounts of animal protein release sulfuric acid through the metabolism of sulfur-containing amino acids, also contributing to an acidic pH.
Potassium bicarbonate, which is sold by prescription, can reduce acidity. Some other mineral supplements, such as those in citrate and carbonate forms, can also reduce acidity.
But the biggest alkaline effect comes from eating lots of fruits and vegetables. Even citrus fruits and tomatoes, which are acidic, have a net alkaline yield. That's because fruits and vegetables are rich in potassium and bicarbonate, both of which produce an alkaline pH. Eating 35 percent of your calories as fruits and vegetables is enough to maintain alkalinity – and help preserve your bones and muscle.
And Speaking of Acid-Alkaline Balance…
A lack of magnesium and calcium can contribute to many serious health problems including arrhythmias, osteoporosis, migraine, and fatal heart attack. The body’s levels of these essential minerals are strongly influenced by dietary levels – and by whether the overall diet produces an acid or alkaline load.
Ragnar Rylander, PhD, Thomas Remer, PhD, and their colleagues at the University of Goteborg, Sweden, studied 85 men and women, most in their sixties. The researchers measured the subject’s urine levels of magnesium, calcium, potassium, and acidity over 24 hours.
Rylander and Remer found that both magnesium and calcium losses in the urine were highest when urine was the most acidic. The loss of magnesium was not influenced by magnesium intake.
“Magnesium deficiency could thus, apart from insufficient intake, partly be caused by the acid load in the body,” wrote the researchers.
They also noted that “the Western diet induces a chronic low-grade metabolic acidosis.” Reference: Rylander R, Remer T, Berkemeyer S, et al. Acid-base status affects renal magnesium losses in healthy, elderly persons. Journal of Nutrition, 2006;136:2374-2377.
Recently, I became a believer. It turns out that acid and alkaline foods do have a bearing on health, but that the science has often been misunderstood or misrepresented. (See the article that follows.) The body functions best at a neutral or slightly alkaline pH. The problem has nothing to do with whether foods are acidic or alkaline per se. Rather, it’s about whether foods have an acid or alkaline effect after digestion and when they reach the kidneys.
Because the body strives to maintain a neutral pH, acid-yielding foods trigger the release of calcium and magnesium from bone and ammonia from the protein in muscles. The calcium, magnesium, and ammonia neutralize the acid, but they do so at a serious price: both bones and muscles weaken, over the long term setting the stage of osteoporosis and age-related loss of muscle mass and strength.
The principal acid-generating foods are animal proteins, grains, dairy products, and any food with a lot of added salt. The salt yields both sodium and chloride, which shift the body toward an acidic pH. Large amounts of animal protein release sulfuric acid through the metabolism of sulfur-containing amino acids, also contributing to an acidic pH.
Potassium bicarbonate, which is sold by prescription, can reduce acidity. Some other mineral supplements, such as those in citrate and carbonate forms, can also reduce acidity.
But the biggest alkaline effect comes from eating lots of fruits and vegetables. Even citrus fruits and tomatoes, which are acidic, have a net alkaline yield. That's because fruits and vegetables are rich in potassium and bicarbonate, both of which produce an alkaline pH. Eating 35 percent of your calories as fruits and vegetables is enough to maintain alkalinity – and help preserve your bones and muscle.
And Speaking of Acid-Alkaline Balance…
A lack of magnesium and calcium can contribute to many serious health problems including arrhythmias, osteoporosis, migraine, and fatal heart attack. The body’s levels of these essential minerals are strongly influenced by dietary levels – and by whether the overall diet produces an acid or alkaline load.
Ragnar Rylander, PhD, Thomas Remer, PhD, and their colleagues at the University of Goteborg, Sweden, studied 85 men and women, most in their sixties. The researchers measured the subject’s urine levels of magnesium, calcium, potassium, and acidity over 24 hours.
Rylander and Remer found that both magnesium and calcium losses in the urine were highest when urine was the most acidic. The loss of magnesium was not influenced by magnesium intake.
“Magnesium deficiency could thus, apart from insufficient intake, partly be caused by the acid load in the body,” wrote the researchers.
They also noted that “the Western diet induces a chronic low-grade metabolic acidosis.” Reference: Rylander R, Remer T, Berkemeyer S, et al. Acid-base status affects renal magnesium losses in healthy, elderly persons. Journal of Nutrition, 2006;136:2374-2377.
Wednesday, January 30, 2008
Statins: A Cure Worse than the Disease
The ads for cholesterol-lowering statin drugs – Lipitor, Crestor, Vytorin, and others – feel like a feeding frenzy. Their makers have turned a symptom -- elevated cholesterol -- into a disease that must be treated with urgency. It has paid off royally – Lipitor sales alone are now over $12 billion a year. The problem is that the "cure" is often worse than the "disease."
An article in the journal BioFactors (2005;25:147-152) described 50 cardiology patients who were plagued with a variety of symptoms, including statin-induced cardiomyopathy, a disease of the heart muscle that has nothing to do with cholesterol. Other common symptoms included fatigue, muscle pain, breathing difficulties, memory problems, and nerve disorders.
Statin drugs inhibit an enzyme involved in synthesizing cholesterol, but the same enzyme is also needed to make coenzyme Q10, a vitamin-like substance that was the basis of the 1978 Nobel prize in chemistry. CoQ10 is essential for life,r normal muscle function, and energy production in the body.
The 50 patients were treated with CoQ10, the dose averaging 240 mg daily, for almost two years. The prevalence of muscle pain among these patients decreased from 64 to 6 percent between their first and latest medical exam. Fatigue decreased from 84 to 16 percent, breathing difficulties from 58 to 12 percent, memory problems from 8 to 4 percent, and nerve problems from 10 to 2 percent. CoQ10 also improved heart function and reduced “statin cardiomyopathy” in half of the patients.
The pharmaceutical industry is well aware of the dangers posed by statins -- and the health benefits of CoQ10. Merck, the maker of the statin drug Zocor, owns two use patents (#4,933,165 and 4,929,437) that combine CoQ10 with statins to prevent and reverse statin-induced cardiomyopthy. To knowingly hurt patients and withhold treatment is nothing less than unethical.
An article in the journal BioFactors (2005;25:147-152) described 50 cardiology patients who were plagued with a variety of symptoms, including statin-induced cardiomyopathy, a disease of the heart muscle that has nothing to do with cholesterol. Other common symptoms included fatigue, muscle pain, breathing difficulties, memory problems, and nerve disorders.
Statin drugs inhibit an enzyme involved in synthesizing cholesterol, but the same enzyme is also needed to make coenzyme Q10, a vitamin-like substance that was the basis of the 1978 Nobel prize in chemistry. CoQ10 is essential for life,r normal muscle function, and energy production in the body.
The 50 patients were treated with CoQ10, the dose averaging 240 mg daily, for almost two years. The prevalence of muscle pain among these patients decreased from 64 to 6 percent between their first and latest medical exam. Fatigue decreased from 84 to 16 percent, breathing difficulties from 58 to 12 percent, memory problems from 8 to 4 percent, and nerve problems from 10 to 2 percent. CoQ10 also improved heart function and reduced “statin cardiomyopathy” in half of the patients.
The pharmaceutical industry is well aware of the dangers posed by statins -- and the health benefits of CoQ10. Merck, the maker of the statin drug Zocor, owns two use patents (#4,933,165 and 4,929,437) that combine CoQ10 with statins to prevent and reverse statin-induced cardiomyopthy. To knowingly hurt patients and withhold treatment is nothing less than unethical.
Saturday, January 19, 2008
Why Nutrition Should Come Before Any Other Therapy
We all have our biases, and mine tilt me toward the use of nutritional therapies above all others.
I don't discount the others – I just don't see herbs, homeopathy, acupuncture, drugs, or other therapies having the same fundamental importance as nutrition.
Why do I feel so strongly about nutrition? It's simple, really. Nutrients provide the building blocks of our biochemistry. Even our genes require nutrients for synthesis, repair, and regulation. All of the proteins, enzymes, tissues, and other substances that make up our body originate with nutrients.
I believe that most of what goes wrong in our bodies is related to inadequate or unbalanced nutrients interacting with our genes and stresses.
How can you determine your nutritional status? The most accurate way is through blood testing of nutrient levels. When it comes to dealing with chronic diseases, it only makes sense to identify nutritional deficiencies and imbalances before proceeding with any kind of therapy. Changes in diet and supplements usually can lead to quick improvements.
Unfortunately, as you well know, modern medicine and health care may little attention to nutrition.
While herbs are far better and safer than drugs, I think it is prudent to first identify and correct dietary problems, especially in chronic diseases. Herbs are rich in antioxidants, but they also contain substances that seem to work through pharmacological means. In other words, their constituents may not always be a normal part of our biochemistry.
I feel the same way about homeopathy. The theory behind homeopathy – that smaller and often undetectable amounts of substances have stronger therapeutic effects – often dumbfounds people. However, molecular biology has taught us that extremely small amounts of substances can have profound effects. Just consider that all the growth hormone in your body would fill no more than 1/40,000th of a teaspoon. Again, I believe that nutrition should come first. While homeopathy might sometimes cure, it does not nourish the body.
After nutrition, I believe that stress reduction and physical activity are paramount. Stress triggers changes that increase our nutritional and biochemical requirements to restore homeostasis. Physical activity increases biochemical activities, so nutrients are put to better use. Again, there's no way to escape the fundamental importance of nutrition.
Read more about nutrition at www.nutritionreporter.com.
I don't discount the others – I just don't see herbs, homeopathy, acupuncture, drugs, or other therapies having the same fundamental importance as nutrition.
Why do I feel so strongly about nutrition? It's simple, really. Nutrients provide the building blocks of our biochemistry. Even our genes require nutrients for synthesis, repair, and regulation. All of the proteins, enzymes, tissues, and other substances that make up our body originate with nutrients.
I believe that most of what goes wrong in our bodies is related to inadequate or unbalanced nutrients interacting with our genes and stresses.
How can you determine your nutritional status? The most accurate way is through blood testing of nutrient levels. When it comes to dealing with chronic diseases, it only makes sense to identify nutritional deficiencies and imbalances before proceeding with any kind of therapy. Changes in diet and supplements usually can lead to quick improvements.
Unfortunately, as you well know, modern medicine and health care may little attention to nutrition.
While herbs are far better and safer than drugs, I think it is prudent to first identify and correct dietary problems, especially in chronic diseases. Herbs are rich in antioxidants, but they also contain substances that seem to work through pharmacological means. In other words, their constituents may not always be a normal part of our biochemistry.
I feel the same way about homeopathy. The theory behind homeopathy – that smaller and often undetectable amounts of substances have stronger therapeutic effects – often dumbfounds people. However, molecular biology has taught us that extremely small amounts of substances can have profound effects. Just consider that all the growth hormone in your body would fill no more than 1/40,000th of a teaspoon. Again, I believe that nutrition should come first. While homeopathy might sometimes cure, it does not nourish the body.
After nutrition, I believe that stress reduction and physical activity are paramount. Stress triggers changes that increase our nutritional and biochemical requirements to restore homeostasis. Physical activity increases biochemical activities, so nutrients are put to better use. Again, there's no way to escape the fundamental importance of nutrition.
Read more about nutrition at www.nutritionreporter.com.
Herb-Drug Combo Dangers...Or Medical Scare Tactics
I’ve just read, for the umpteenth time, another article on the supposed “dangers” of herb-drug interactions. This one, published in one of the largest-circulation health newsletters in the United States, was titled “How to Avoid Dangerous Herb-Drug Interactions,” with the subtitle of “Harmful Effects Can Occur When Taking Popular Supplements with Commonly Used Medications.”
You'd think that people are dropping like flies. That's just not the case.
Let’s put all this in perspective. Are there potential risks from mixing herbs with prescription drugs? Yes, there are. But there are far greater risks from prescription drugs alone and from taking two or more drugs, a very common situation.
An estimated 106,000 people die each year from medications prescribed in hospitals—where you would think the most rigorous controls would be in place. More than 2 million other hospitalized Americans experience serious reactions to prescription medications. God only knows how many people outside of hospitals have serious side effects or die from their medications.
How many people died last year from taking herb or vitamin supplements? Hmmm...let me see now...wow...not a single person.
Articles on the dangers of herb-drug interactions overplay relatively rare problems. This particular article emphasized problems combining chile pepper extract, ginger, and green tea with drugs. Unknowingly, the author was attacking foods that are major components of many ethnic diets.
Many doctors would like to control all of the variables in a person’s life to reduce the risk of negative interactions. But it’s an impossible task. Go into almost any Mexican restaurant and you'll find meals with chile. Ditto for Asian restaurants and ginger and green tea.
Then there are the variables related to genetics, stress, nutritional deficiencies, and a host of other factors affecting what herbs or drugs do in our bodies.
Trying to control all these variables is an impossible task. Frightening people about rare problems with useful herbs (as condiments or traditional remedies) doesn’t do a lot of good. The real solution, if physicians are willing, is two-fold: one, recognize the dangers that drugs pose by themselves and prescribe them only as a last resort; and, two, to evaluate patients as individuals in the overall context of their diets, meds, and lifestyles.
As always, you can read more about nutrition and health at my main web site, www.nutritionreporter.com.
You'd think that people are dropping like flies. That's just not the case.
Let’s put all this in perspective. Are there potential risks from mixing herbs with prescription drugs? Yes, there are. But there are far greater risks from prescription drugs alone and from taking two or more drugs, a very common situation.
An estimated 106,000 people die each year from medications prescribed in hospitals—where you would think the most rigorous controls would be in place. More than 2 million other hospitalized Americans experience serious reactions to prescription medications. God only knows how many people outside of hospitals have serious side effects or die from their medications.
How many people died last year from taking herb or vitamin supplements? Hmmm...let me see now...wow...not a single person.
Articles on the dangers of herb-drug interactions overplay relatively rare problems. This particular article emphasized problems combining chile pepper extract, ginger, and green tea with drugs. Unknowingly, the author was attacking foods that are major components of many ethnic diets.
Many doctors would like to control all of the variables in a person’s life to reduce the risk of negative interactions. But it’s an impossible task. Go into almost any Mexican restaurant and you'll find meals with chile. Ditto for Asian restaurants and ginger and green tea.
Then there are the variables related to genetics, stress, nutritional deficiencies, and a host of other factors affecting what herbs or drugs do in our bodies.
Trying to control all these variables is an impossible task. Frightening people about rare problems with useful herbs (as condiments or traditional remedies) doesn’t do a lot of good. The real solution, if physicians are willing, is two-fold: one, recognize the dangers that drugs pose by themselves and prescribe them only as a last resort; and, two, to evaluate patients as individuals in the overall context of their diets, meds, and lifestyles.
As always, you can read more about nutrition and health at my main web site, www.nutritionreporter.com.
Sunday, January 6, 2008
Vitamin D - More Better than Less
Until the past several years, doctors and dietitians were usually scared off by the thought of vitamin D supplementation. Evidence that’s now recognized as terribly archaic suggested that supplemental vitamin D could be toxic in amounts modestly above official “recommended” levels.
What has changed? Vitamin D is needed for both strong bones and strong skeletal muscles, which hold up those bones. A huge body of research has found that a minimum of 800 IU of vitamin D daily is required to reduce the risk of falls and fractures among the elderly. The latest research indicates that adequate vitamin D levels can reduce the risk of cancer, heart disease, diabetes, and many other diseases.
Some dosage recommendations go far higher, and even the ever-cautious researchers at Harvard University are now suggesting higher dosages. In a interview, Harvard‘s Walter C. Willett, MD, DrPH, told me that many people could benefit from supplements containing 2,000 to 5,000 IU of vitamin D daily.
Still other researchers, such as Reinhold Vieth, PhD, of the University of Toronto, recommend upwards of 10,000 IU daily. Simply spending 15 minutes in the summer sun, in walking shorts and a tee shirt, enables your body to make 10,000 IU. Contrast these numbers with the meager Reference Daily Intake (RDI) of 200 to 500 IU. Food sources of vitamin D are limited, and it‘s common for people to develop marginal vitamin D levels or outright deficiencies during the winter months when they are exposed to little sunlight.
Get out a map, and if you live north of Phoenix, Arizona – 35° north – you probably don't get enough winter sun exposure even if you spend lots of time outdoors. That means you should most likely supplement with vitamin D. If you spend most of the year indoors, regardless of your latitude, you may never adequately build up your vitamin D levels, meaning that you will probably benefit from year-round supplementation.
What has changed? Vitamin D is needed for both strong bones and strong skeletal muscles, which hold up those bones. A huge body of research has found that a minimum of 800 IU of vitamin D daily is required to reduce the risk of falls and fractures among the elderly. The latest research indicates that adequate vitamin D levels can reduce the risk of cancer, heart disease, diabetes, and many other diseases.
Some dosage recommendations go far higher, and even the ever-cautious researchers at Harvard University are now suggesting higher dosages. In a interview, Harvard‘s Walter C. Willett, MD, DrPH, told me that many people could benefit from supplements containing 2,000 to 5,000 IU of vitamin D daily.
Still other researchers, such as Reinhold Vieth, PhD, of the University of Toronto, recommend upwards of 10,000 IU daily. Simply spending 15 minutes in the summer sun, in walking shorts and a tee shirt, enables your body to make 10,000 IU. Contrast these numbers with the meager Reference Daily Intake (RDI) of 200 to 500 IU. Food sources of vitamin D are limited, and it‘s common for people to develop marginal vitamin D levels or outright deficiencies during the winter months when they are exposed to little sunlight.
Get out a map, and if you live north of Phoenix, Arizona – 35° north – you probably don't get enough winter sun exposure even if you spend lots of time outdoors. That means you should most likely supplement with vitamin D. If you spend most of the year indoors, regardless of your latitude, you may never adequately build up your vitamin D levels, meaning that you will probably benefit from year-round supplementation.
The Risk of Genetically Modified Foods
In a study recently published in the Archives of Environmental Contamination and Toxicology,
researchers re-analyzed data from Monsanto-sponsored experiments in which a type of genetically modified corn (MON863) was fed to laboratory rats for three months. The data had been company confidential until a German court ruled that thepublic could have access to the data for 90 days.
Using this data, French researchers found that consumption of the genetically modified corn led to disturbing changes in the laboratory rats. Male rats lost an average of 3.3 percent of body weight, while female rats gained 3.7 percent weight compared with controls. The animals showed signs of liver and kidney toxicity. Blood sugar levels rose, and the animals had a 24 to 40 percent increase in triglyceride levels, which would point to a greater risk of diabetes and heart disease.
The MON863 produces an insecticide that kills the corn roundworm, but like other synthetic pesticides, it appears to have broader deleterious effects. The genetic modification of food tampers with the normal biological evolution of plants in ways that would not likely occur in nature. By consequence, these changes can affect the genetic programming of species that consume them. The specific mechanisms may be subtle and as yet undetermined, but it's clear
that genetically modified foods can have unwanted health consequences.
Our genes are particularly sensitive to toxins and to low levels of nutrients and toxins, with the
consequence being an increased risk of cancer and other diseases, and risk may be passed to offspring.
A single toxin might not have much of an effect on our health. But when you add it to the thousands of other toxic chemicals in our food and environment, we move closer to our individual tipping points – the threshold at which our innate ability to defend ourselves and repair genetic damage falters. We may not be able to control all of the hazards in our foods
and environment, but it is irrational to unnecessarily expose ourselves to any more than we must.
Monsanto has promoted genetically modified foods as a way of increasing crop yields and reducing worldwide hunger. Such statements are more selfserving media spin than altruism. No decrease in world hunger can be attributed to the use of genetically modified foods. Rather, Monsanto and other companies have created a “need” and new agricultural markets for unnecessary and harmful products. We may actually be better off with less than more
corn, one of the most common food allergens.
researchers re-analyzed data from Monsanto-sponsored experiments in which a type of genetically modified corn (MON863) was fed to laboratory rats for three months. The data had been company confidential until a German court ruled that thepublic could have access to the data for 90 days.
Using this data, French researchers found that consumption of the genetically modified corn led to disturbing changes in the laboratory rats. Male rats lost an average of 3.3 percent of body weight, while female rats gained 3.7 percent weight compared with controls. The animals showed signs of liver and kidney toxicity. Blood sugar levels rose, and the animals had a 24 to 40 percent increase in triglyceride levels, which would point to a greater risk of diabetes and heart disease.
The MON863 produces an insecticide that kills the corn roundworm, but like other synthetic pesticides, it appears to have broader deleterious effects. The genetic modification of food tampers with the normal biological evolution of plants in ways that would not likely occur in nature. By consequence, these changes can affect the genetic programming of species that consume them. The specific mechanisms may be subtle and as yet undetermined, but it's clear
that genetically modified foods can have unwanted health consequences.
Our genes are particularly sensitive to toxins and to low levels of nutrients and toxins, with the
consequence being an increased risk of cancer and other diseases, and risk may be passed to offspring.
A single toxin might not have much of an effect on our health. But when you add it to the thousands of other toxic chemicals in our food and environment, we move closer to our individual tipping points – the threshold at which our innate ability to defend ourselves and repair genetic damage falters. We may not be able to control all of the hazards in our foods
and environment, but it is irrational to unnecessarily expose ourselves to any more than we must.
Monsanto has promoted genetically modified foods as a way of increasing crop yields and reducing worldwide hunger. Such statements are more selfserving media spin than altruism. No decrease in world hunger can be attributed to the use of genetically modified foods. Rather, Monsanto and other companies have created a “need” and new agricultural markets for unnecessary and harmful products. We may actually be better off with less than more
corn, one of the most common food allergens.
What Should You Eat?
“Black raspberries may prevent cancer of esophagus.”
“Blueberries may help old folks keep their smarts.”
“Green tea may reduce prostate cancer risk.”
These are a few of the many news headlines I’ve recently read while tracking the latest nutrition research. Any number of foods or their nutritional ingredients are regularly touted as superfoods, functional foods, or nutraceuticals. Unfortunately, such headlines are often misleading.
You’re not going to significantly reduce your risk of disease or achieve optimal health by eating a bowl of black raspberries every day. They’ll certainly taste great and will provide some health benefits, of course. But good health doesn’t result from eating a single food – it comes from healthy eating habits.
In other words, think in terms of the forest, not trees, nutritionally speaking.
Eating a healthy diet isn’t all that mysterious. If you follow two simple rules, you’ll be on the right track most of the time.
First, eat mostly fresh foods instead of processed and packaged foods. Fresh foods look something like they do in nature. For example, a salmon filet looks like part of a fish, which a fish stick does not. As a general rule, fresh foods received less tampering compared with processed foods. Most processed foods have added sugars, refined carbs, sodium, or unhealthy fats – or all of them – adding up to high-calorie nonnutrients.
Second, eat a diverse selection of foods, including quality protein, healthy fats, and a lot of vegetables. A diversity of foods translates into a bounty of nutrients, many of which have not been extensively studied and as a result don’t garner a lot of headlines. For example, a recent study reported that curcumin, the active compound in the spice turmeric, blocked inflammation through 97 distinct mechanisms. That’s just one spice, out of hundreds of options to choose from at your local market.
“Blueberries may help old folks keep their smarts.”
“Green tea may reduce prostate cancer risk.”
These are a few of the many news headlines I’ve recently read while tracking the latest nutrition research. Any number of foods or their nutritional ingredients are regularly touted as superfoods, functional foods, or nutraceuticals. Unfortunately, such headlines are often misleading.
You’re not going to significantly reduce your risk of disease or achieve optimal health by eating a bowl of black raspberries every day. They’ll certainly taste great and will provide some health benefits, of course. But good health doesn’t result from eating a single food – it comes from healthy eating habits.
In other words, think in terms of the forest, not trees, nutritionally speaking.
Eating a healthy diet isn’t all that mysterious. If you follow two simple rules, you’ll be on the right track most of the time.
First, eat mostly fresh foods instead of processed and packaged foods. Fresh foods look something like they do in nature. For example, a salmon filet looks like part of a fish, which a fish stick does not. As a general rule, fresh foods received less tampering compared with processed foods. Most processed foods have added sugars, refined carbs, sodium, or unhealthy fats – or all of them – adding up to high-calorie nonnutrients.
Second, eat a diverse selection of foods, including quality protein, healthy fats, and a lot of vegetables. A diversity of foods translates into a bounty of nutrients, many of which have not been extensively studied and as a result don’t garner a lot of headlines. For example, a recent study reported that curcumin, the active compound in the spice turmeric, blocked inflammation through 97 distinct mechanisms. That’s just one spice, out of hundreds of options to choose from at your local market.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
